Category: True Story

Hello! It’s Friday! That is something to celebrate, dear nonfiction friends. I was supposed to go hiking with a friend this weekend, but the forecast looks like rain… I’m sad about missing nature, but perhaps that will mean more time for books!

This week’s nonfiction news feels like a preview for the rest of what we’ll be seeing in 2019 – book prize announcements and political scandals. Let’s just get into it!

This week, the finalists for the Kirkus Prize were announced. Although this prize may not be well-known outside literary circles, the cash money is huge – $50,000 each for the winners in fiction, nonfiction, and young readers’ literature. I’m excited about the nonfiction list:

• Go Ahead in the Rain: Notes to A Tribe Called Quest by Hanif Abdurraqib
• When Death Takes Something from You Give It Back: Carl’s Book by Naja Marie Aidt, translated by Denise Newman
• How We Fight for Our Lives: A Memoir by Saeed Jones
• Say Nothing: A True Story of Murder and Memory in Northern Ireland by Patrick Radden Keefe
• The Ungrateful Refugee: What Immigrants Never Tell You by Dina Nayeri
• No Visible Bruises: What We Don’t Know About Domestic Violence Can Kill Us by Rachel Louise Snyder

I’ve only read one – No Visible Bruises – but several of the others have been on my list this year. The TBR grows!

The New York Times is facing some criticism over their coverage of a new nonfiction book, The Education of Brett Kavanaugh by reporters Robin Pogrebin and Kate Kelly. The paper decided to run an excerpt of the book in the book review section, but the excerpt alleges some additional serious accusations against Kavanaugh. According to Vanity Fair, “Sources say Robin Pogrebin and Kate Kelly initially pitched their reporting to the news side, but top editors ultimately felt that there wasn’t enough juice to warrant a story there—punting the scoop to the Sunday Review section.” And there’s a lot more beyond that concern – definitely check out the article for more.

Edward Snowden is being sued by the U.S. government. The Verge reported that the Justice Department has filed a civil lawsuit against Snowden to try and recover the proceeds of his memoir, Permanent Record. They allege that because the book was not submitted to intelligence agencies for review, Snowden has improperly released information and shouldn’t benefit from the book. This whole thing just makes me laugh.

And that’s the news for this week. You can find me on Twitter @kimthedork, on email at kim@riotnewmedia.com, and co-hosting the For Real podcast here at Book Riot. Happy reading! – Kim

Hello and happy Wednesday, nonfiction nerds! We are in the middle of a September hot streak in Minnesota and it is amazing. This weekend, I sat out on my porch in shorts and a t-shirt! Unheard of! I’ve also been reading up a storm – I finished She Said by Jodi Kantor and Megan Twohey, an account of breaking the Harvey Weinstein story, and absolutely adored it. 

This week is another good one for new books. I’ve got three books to highlight, plus five more that could find a spot on your TBR. Onward! 

Nice Try: Stories of Best Intentions and Mixed Results by Josh Gondelman – This book is a collection of essays by a comedian who has been described as the “nicest man in comedy.” In it, Gondelman “celebrates a life of good intentions – and mixed results.” Given how hard the world is right now and what a bummer it is to celebrate comedians who try to excuse mean-ness in their work, I’m all for this book. 

Further Reading: His 2017 essay titled “What if I Bombed at My Own Wedding?” is a highlight of the book you can grab online. It made me laugh out loud. If the paywall is an issue, he also recently published a piece for BuzzFeed called “The 2 Best Times I’ve Fainted As A Grown Man.”

Think Black: A Memoir by Clyde W. Ford – Clyde W. Ford’s father, John, was the first black software engineer hired at IBM. Although accomplished, the racism John faced each day had an emotional cost that damaged him and the relationship he had with his son. When Clyde joined IBM two decades later, he discovered the same institutional racism at work and gained a new appreciation of his father’s work. 

Background Reading: On his blog, Ford shares the origins of the book, including how it had origins as a 10-episode television series.  

Monster, She Wrote: The Women Who Pioneered Horror and Speculative Fiction by Lisa Kröger and Melanie R. Anderson – Although authors like Mary Shelley and Shirley Jackson are household names, they’re far from the earliest or most prolific women writing horror and science fiction stories. This book explores the contributions that women have made to the genre in the past and into the future. The book has more than 100 authors and 200 recommended novels, novellas, and short stories. Amazing!

Further Reading: Tor.com published an excerpt from the book about Margaret Cavendish, a writer who produced” strange fiction a century before Gothic novels came along.”

1. The Seven Necessary Sins for Women and Girls by Mona Eltahawy
2. Wildhood: The Epic Journey from Adolescence to Adulthood in Humans and Other Animals by Dr. Barbara Natterson-Horowitz and Kathryn Bowers
3. Coventry by Rachel Cusk
4. On Fire: The (Burning) Case for a Green New Deal by Naomi Klein 
5. That Will Never Work: The Birth of Netflix and the Amazing Life of an Idea by Marc Randolph

Before you click on through your email, follow this link to enter Book Riot’s enter our giveaway of the year’s 10 best mystery/thrillers so far!

You can find me on Twitter @kimthedork, on email at kim@riotnewmedia.com, and co-hosting the For Real podcast here at Book Riot. This week, Alice and I took a deep dive into many of September’s best new releases. Happy reading! – Kim

Hello and happy Friday the 13th, nonfiction friends! I can only hope this potentially unlucky day treats you well, and you go into the weekend with a full pile of books and a hot cup of whatever seasonal beverage makes you happy.

This week’s collection of nonfiction news gave me all the feels – giggles, squeals, sighs, cheers, and groans. Let’s get into it!

Giggles – I’ve been reading a lot of long-form journalism lately, so this Onion article really made me laugh. The kicker is also great, especially, given some other news I found this week (keep reading!).

Squeals – The official trailer for Just Mercy is here, and I think it looks awesome! I’m also excited that one of my favorite critics, Linda Holmes, tweeted some generally positive comments about the movie after seeing a screening at the Toronto International Film Festival. You can also consider this your weekly reminder to pick up Bryan Stevenson’s book!

Sighs – Erik Larson announced that his next book will be set during the Nazi blitz of London in 1940 and 1941. I’m a little bummed by this news because I like Erik Larson but don’t especially enjoy books about World War II. In an interview, Larson said he hopes to find ways to tell the story of Winston Churchill’s first year as prime minister in a new way, but that feels like a tall order. I guess we’ll know more when the book arrives in March 2020.

Cheers – Joshua Hammer’s The Bad-Ass Librarians of Timbuktu is being made into a documentary! The documentary will focus on a group of scholars that “transformed themselves into a roving gang of smugglers” to transport the ancient texts across the desert. It’s an interesting, readable book that I think will translate well into a documentary.

Groans – Sarah Huckabee Sanders is writing a memoir about her life and tenure as the White House Press Secretary. Given how much time she spent lying to the American people from the White House, I can’t bring myself to care about what she has to say about anything. It’s just… so annoying that bad people keep getting book deals. The only good thing about this news is all of the hilarious title suggestions folks offered on Twitter.

Whew, that’s enough news to round out the week. Before you go, click through to enter Book Riot’s enter our giveaway of the year’s 10 best mystery/thrillers so far! It’s an amazing list!

You can find me on Twitter @kimthedork, on email at kim@riotnewmedia.com, and co-hosting the For Real podcast here at Book Riot. Happy reading! – Kim

Hello and happy second-week-of-September, fellow reading nerds. I think the arrival of fall has helped pick up my reading mojo just a bit – I’ve finished four books already this month, and I hope I won’t stop that pace any time soon.

And that’s good because, to borrow a phrase from my favorite velocireader, there are an absolutely banana-pants number of books coming out this week. I’ve decided to pull the 10 that I’m most interested in, but please know there are many, many others you could grab. Let’s dive in!

For the Love of Men: A New Vision for Mindful Masculinity by Liz Plank – A look at toxic masculinity and what all of us can do to live better and help others do the same.

Audience of One: Donald Trump, Television, and the Fracturing of America by James Poniewozik – The chief television critic for the New York Times offers a history of television and mass media in America, paired with a history of Donald Trump and how he used mass media to win the presidency.

The Years That Matter Most: How College Makes or Breaks Us by Paul Tough – “Does college still work? Is the system designed just to protect the privileged and leave everyone else behind? Or can a college education today provide real opportunity to young Americans seeking to improve their station in life?”

Billion Dollar Fantasy: The High-Stakes Game Between FanDuel and DraftKings That Upended Sports in America by Albert Chen – This one’s for all the fantasy sports nerds out there! A Sports Illustrated reporter looks at how two rival daily fantasy sports gambling websites went from billion-dollar companies to targets of investigations by the FBI and Department of Justice. Yikes!

How to Fight Anti-Semitism by Bari Weiss – In the wake of the 2018 mass shooting at Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh, Weiss looks at how anti-Semitism is on the rise again and finding a way to migrate into the mainstream.

She Said: Breaking the Sexual Harassment Story that Helped Ignite a Movement by Jodi Kantor and Megan Twohey – The New York Times journalists who broke the story about Harvey Weinstein tell the story of their investigation and explore what it took to get the evidence they needed to finally reveal his history of harassment.

Talking to Strangers: What We Should Know About the People We Don’t Know by Malcolm Gladwell – “A powerful examination of our interactions with strangers – and why they often go wrong.”

Fantasy Island: Colonialism, Exploitation, and the Betrayal of Puerto Rico by Ed Morales – Puerto Rico has been an American colony for 122 years. This book looks at a history of the island since 1989 and how it has “served as a testing ground for the most aggressive and exploitative US economic, political, and social policies.”

Guest House for Young Widows: Among the Women of ISIS by Azadeh Moaveni – A look at 13 women who joined ISIS, initially responding to “promises of female empowerment and social justice, and calls to aid the plight of fellow Muslims in Syria” that turned out to be entirely false.

The Only Plane in the Sky: An Oral History of 9/11 by Garrett M. Graff – A history of the September 11, 2001 attacks that offers “a 360-degree account of the day told through the voices of the people who experienced it.”

What Is a Girl Worth?: My Story of Breaking the Silence and Exposing the Truth about Larry Nassar and USA Gymnastics by Rachael Denhollander – In this memoir, the first woman to publicly accuse Larry Nassar of abusing members of USA Gymnastics shares her story.

The Education of an Idealist: A Memoir by Samantha Power – In this memoir, an activist shares her journey “from immigrant to war correspondent to presidential Cabinet official” and Ambassador to the United Nations.

And don’t forget, you can enter Book Riot’s enter our giveaway of the year’s 10 best mystery/thrillers so far! It’s an amazing list!

You can find me on Twitter @kimthedork, on email at kim@riotnewmedia.com, and co-hosting the For Real podcast here at Book Riot. Happy reading! – Kim

Hellooooo, nonfiction fans!

It is, once more, me, Alice, co-host of Book Riot’s nonfiction podcast For Real and your substitute Kim for today’s True Story newsletter. While I have neither the calm grace nor journalistic background of a Kim, I do have a lot of enthusiasm for FACTS.

With that in mind, today we’re going to do a roundup of some good nonfiction reads to shove in your bookbag, stow in your work satchel, or carefully fold into your bindle as you roam this country in a rail car. I don’t know your life. None of these are super long or overly ponderous, if you know what I mean (side-eyes Chernow’s Hamilton).

Good On-the-Go Reads

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot. Obviously. Super readable, great info, and a story that should have been told well before this.

The Disappearing Spoon: And Other True Tales of Madness, Love, and the History of the World from the Periodic Table of the Elements by Sam Kean. I read this and started throwing out amazing facts at everyone I met.

The Autobiography of Malcolm X by Malcolm X. This book will stay with you for a long, long time.

We Should All Be Feminists by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. It’s pocket-sized! And you can read it in an afternoon and then feel a proud sense of ACCOMPLISHMENT.

The Boys in the Boat: Nine American and Their Epic Quest for Gold at the 1936 Berlin Olympics by Daniel James Brown. Ok, I haven’t read this, but everyone else has and they love it.

Spare Parts: Four Undocumented Teenagers, One Ugly Robot, and the Battle for the American Dream by Joshua Davis. I recommended this on For Real this week and I am saying it again here because: robots! Teen angst! Immigration! Hope! A classic underdog story! This book has it all.

That’s it for now! An honor to be here subbing, as always. You can find me and Kim on For Real every other Tuesday (don’t forget to subscribe). Happy weekend and keep nonfictioning!

Hello and happy September, nonfiction friends! As sad as I am to see this summer start to wind down, there’s been something very soothing about the slide into fall this year. The air feels crisp, I’m eating a lot of apples, and the fall publishing season is kicking off.

This week, I have 10 interesting new books to put on your radar. Let’s go!

My Time Among the Whites: Notes from an Unfinished Education by Jennine Capó Crucet – A collection of essays on being an “accidental” American and “her family’s attempts to fit in with white American culture.”

Axiomatic by Maria Tumarkin – A look at “the ways we understand the traumas we inherit and the systems that sustain them.”

How To: Absurd Scientific Advice for Common Real-World Problems by Randall Munroe – The creator of the webcomic xkcd is back with an “entertaining and useless” self-help guide of ridiculous solutions to common problems.

Elements of Fiction by Walter Mosley – A guide to writing fiction that “transcends convention and truly stands out.”

Fentanyl, Inc.: How Rogue Chemists Are Creating the Deadliest Wave of the Opioid Epidemic by Ben Westhoff – An investigation into the world of synthetic drugs, from factories in China to dealers in the United States, and how they’re part of the next wave of the opioid crisis.

The Ungrateful Refugee: What Immigrants Never Tell You by Dina Nayeri – A memoir by a refugee that also shares “the stories of other refugees and asylum seekers in recent years, bringing us inside their daily lives and taking us through the different stages of their journeys.”

Scan Artist: How Evelyn Wood Convinced the World that Speed-Reading Worked by Marcia Biederman – A true-life con story about a woman with no background in education and little classroom experience who became a renowned teacher of speed reading.

Super Pumped: The Battle for Uber by Mike Isaac – An inside peek at Uber during 2017, a dramatic year when the company rose to the top of the tech world and removed its CEO in a boardroom coup.

Unbreakable: The Woman Who Defied the Nazis in the World’s Most Dangerous Horse Race by Richard Askwith – “The courageous and heartbreaking story of a Czech countess who defied the Nazis in a legendary horse race” in 1937.

Whose Story Is This?: Old Conflicts, New Chapters by Rebecca Solnit – New essays from Rebecca Solnit! This collection explores who gets to shape the narrative of our times.

One last thing for this week: Don’t forget to enter our giveaway of the year’s 10 best mystery/thrillers so far! It’s such a good list!

You can find me on Twitter @kimthedork, on email at kim@riotnewmedia.com, and co-hosting the For Real podcast here at Book Riot. In this week’s episode, Alice and I chatted about books about school. Happy reading! – Kim

Hello, nonfiction friends! It’s the last Friday in August, which means I can sneak in one newsletter in honor of Women in Translation month, an annual celebration that’s been happening around the book world since 2014.

Given my personal interest, this list of nonfiction in translation is heavy on memoirs and books by journalists, but I did manage to get a pretty decent geographic spread in titles. Let’s go!

Voices from Chernobyl: The Oral History of a Nuclear Disaster by Svetlana Alexievich – This book is an account of the 1986 nuclear disaster at Chernobyl, told through the personal stories of people affected by the meltdown. As a collection of monologues, the book was the first to truly give voice to that experience. As a result, parts of this book were the basis for the HBO miniseries Chernobyl. Journalist Svetlana Alexievich is the winner of the 2015 Nobel Prize in Literature, so any of her books would make a great read.

 

In Other Words by Jhumpa Lahiri – Twenty years after studying in Italy and falling in love with the country, novelist Jhumpa Lahiri returned to Rome where she began to read and write exclusively in Italian. This book is a “meditation on the process of learning to express herself in another language – and the stunning journey of a writer seeking a new voice.”

 

 

I’m Writing You from Tehran: A Granddaughter’s Search for Her Family’s Past and Their Country’s Future by Delphine Minoui – After losing her grandfather in 1998, journalist Delphine Minoui decided to go to Iran, her first visit since the Iranian Revolution. She ended up staying a decade, immersing herself in the country, growing as a writer, falling in love, and learning more about her family history.

 

Oriana Fallaci: The Journalist, the Agitator, the Legend by Cristina De Stefano – This biography tells the story of one of Italy’s most famous and controversial journalists. During her career, she conducted blockbuster interviews with leaders like Henry Kissinger, Muammar Gaddafi, Indira Gandhi, and more. She also caused her own share of controversies, “leaving behind epic collateral damage in her wake.”

 

A Massacre in Mexico: The True Story Behind the Missing Forty-Three Students by Anabel Hernández – In 2014, 43 students went missing from a teaching college in Mexico. The young men boarded buses to travel to Mexico City, but disappeared after a confrontation with local police. This book is a definitive account of this mystery that shows the official version of the story from Mexican officials is largely false.

And that’s a wrap! You can find me on Twitter @kimthedork, via email at kim@riotnewmedia.com, and co-hosting the For Real podcast here at Book Riot. Happy reading! – Kim

Hello, nonfiction friends! I cannot believe it’s the last week of August – the summer has absolutely flown by me. This week is another great one for nonfiction new releases. I’ve got three books to feature, plus six more that caught my eye. Let’s get going!

March Sisters: On Life, Death, and Little Women  by Kate Bolick, Carmen Maria Machado, Jane Smiley, and Jenny Zhang – In celebration of the 150th anniversary of Little Women, four authors write about their connections to the novel, including “what it has meant to them and why it still matters.” This is such an interesting combination of writers, and I have such a soft spot for Little Women – it’s right in my wheelhouse.

Bookish Reading: Since this book is so short, I want to direct you to previous/future work by each of the authors – Spinster by Kate Bolick (memoir), In the Dream House by Carmen Maria Machado (memoir), The Man Who Invented the Computer by Jane Smiley (nonfiction), and Sour Heart by Jenny Zhang (short stories).

The Optimist’s Telescope: Thinking Ahead in a Reckless Age by Bina Venkataraman – If you have ever wondered why making the decision that will benefit you most in the long-term is so hard, this is a book for you. Bina Venkataraman, a writer and former Obama administration advisor on climate change, explores the biology, psychology, and economics of making better decisions over time and shares practices we can adopt ourselves and as a society.

Further Reading: It’s not super recent, but Venkataraman’s 2018 article about why we should rethink the idea of a forced quarantine was interesting.

See Jane Win: The Inspiring Story of the Women Changing American Politics by Caitlin Moscatello – The November 2018 midterm elections resulted in a record number of women running for and winning elected offices. In this book, journalist Caitlin Moscatello follows four candidates (one for Congress, three for state offices) through their campaigns and the “brutal realities of running for office while female.”

Further Reading: Earlier this year, Moscatello wrote about the work of Millennial women in Congress and how they’re fighting back against the sexist, ageist rhetoric trying to convince them to keep their heads down and wait their turn.

And finally, a few more titles that I am curious about:

• Five Days Gone: The Mystery of My Mother’s Disappearance as a Child by Laura Cumming
• Silver, Sword, and Stone: Three Crucibles in the Latin American Story by Marie Arana
• Human Relations and Other Difficulties: Essays by Mary-Kay Wilmers
• The Deep History of Ourselves: The Four-Billion-Year Story of How We Got Conscious Brains by Joseph Ledoux
• Inconspicuous Consumption: The Environmental Impact You Don’t Know You Have by Tatiana Schlossberg
• Scam Me If You Can: Simple Strategies to Outsmart Today’s Rip-off Artists by Frank Abagnale

Hooray, new books! You can find me on Twitter @kimthedork, on email at kim@riotnewmedia.com, and co-hosting the For Real podcast here at Book Riot. Happy reading! – Kim

Happy Friday, nonfiction lovers! At the time you’re reading this, I will probably be on my way to the Minnesota State Fair, a summer tradition with food on sticks, 4-H crafts, and faces carved out of butter. It’s a delight!

First up this week, I want to highlight a couple of excellent book lists: 

• NPR has put together a collection of 100 favorite funny books, a combination of readers votes and critics curation. In addition to fiction, the list has some awesome suggestions for funny memoirs, essays, and nonfiction. 
• LitHub is doing a series of fall nonfiction previews. As of the day I’m writing this newsletter, they’ve done essays, memoirs, politics, and social science, with history, biography, science, tech and more still to come. Get ready to topple your TBR. 

Writers Jason Reynolds and Ibram X. Kendi are teaming up to “start an honest conversation about racism with young people” through a new YA version of Kendi’s best-selling book Stamped from the Beginning. The YA adaptation, Stamped: Racism, Antiracism, and You, will be out in March 2020. In an interview, Reynolds said, “I rewrote the book top to bottom… I settled into it and I tried to figure out, if I’m 16, what makes me want to read this book?” I’m fascinated with this idea and can’t wait to read it.

Cyntoia Brown, a child sex-trafficking victim who was jailed after killing one of her johns, has been released from prison and is writing a memoir. Free Cyntoia: My Search of Redemption in the American Prison System is set for release October 15.

There are two interesting bits of news related to one of 2019’s new releases I’m most bummed about not reading yet, Fall and Rise: The Story of 9/11 by Mitchell Zuckoff:

• ABC is in the process of developing a limited series based on the book, which chronicles the events of September 11 through “stories of those who were lost, saved and forever altered by the most heinous acts of terrorism on American soil.” The series is set to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the attacks.
• Zuckoff was interviewed about the book over at The Millions, where he talked about “what he was doing the day of the attacks, what followed, and how a Boston Globe feature published five days after the attacks turned into an essential book more than 6,000 days later.”

Actor Taron Egerton, who played Elton John in the biopic Rocketman, will be reading the audiobook version of the singer’s memoir! Me, out October 15, will be “the first and only official autobiography,” covering his entire life and career. There’s something I find really charming about this news, although I can’t quite pin my finger on what exactly it is. 

And that’s all for this week. You can find me on Twitter @kimthedork, on email at kim@riotnewmedia.com, and co-hosting the For Real podcast here at Book Riot. Happy reading! – Kim

Hello and happy Wednesday, fellow nerds! For this week’s new nonfiction, I’m highlighting a book of essays on mental illness, a look at women and true crime, and an exploration of modern crime and corruption on the high seas. It’s a good week of books!

I’m Telling the Truth, But I’m Lying by Bassey Ikpi – In this collection of essays, “Bassey Ikpi explores her life—as a Nigerian-American immigrant, a black woman, a slam poet, a mother, a daughter, an artist—through the lens of her mental health and diagnosis of bipolar II and anxiety.” She also explores how mental health impacts all aspects of our lives, as well as how we see the world and ourselves. It sounds amazing, and I adore this cover.

Further Listening: (Trigger warning – suicide) Ikpi’s interview with NPR about living with mental illness and her work as a writer and artist is really good.

Savage Appetites: Four True Stories of Women, Crime, and Obsession by Rachel Monroe – True crime! In this book, Rachel Monroe looks at four true crime archetypes (Detective, Victim, Defender, Killer) and ties them to four true stories of obsessive women. Through these women, she also looks at the history of crime in the United States in a book that “explores empathy, justice, and the persistent appeal of violence.”

Further Reading: In an interview with The Cut, Monroe talks about obsessing over true crime with her mom, whether “this intense embrace of a sisterhood of darkness is a reaction against that mandated glowiness” of places like Instagram.

The Outlaw Ocean: Journey’s Across the Last Untamed Frontier by Ian Urbina – Crime on the high seas! One of the last frontiers of the modern world, the world’s oceans are “too big to police, and under no clear international authority (and) play host to rampant criminality and exploitation.” Based on five years of reporting, this book looks at the hidden world of crime and corruption tied to the global fishing, oil, and shipping industries.

Further Reading: In The Atlantic, Urbina shares the story of Sealand, a “micronation” on a metal platform just off the coast of England. It’s so amazing and weird.

And because three books is never enough, here are four more that might pique your interest this week:

• Tonight We Bombed the U.S. Capitol: The Explosive Story of M19, America’s First Female Terrorist Group by William Rosenau
• Girls and Their Cats by BriAnne Wills and Elyse Moody
• The Conscious Closet: The Revolutionary Guide to Looking Good While Doing Good by Elizabeth L. Cline
• What We Talk About When We Talk About Books by Leah Price

Yay, books! You can find me on Twitter @kimthedork, on email at kim@riotnewmedia.com, and co-hosting the For Real podcast here at Book Riot. In this week’s episode, Alice and I scratched the surface of books about cults. Happy reading! – Kim